The attention of the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCOBOD) has been drawn to a supposed research conducted by a group known as the Center for Socioeconomic Studies (CSS) which has received wide media publication.
The said report indicates that, through several calls from the cocoa farmers and further investigations by the CSS, it was revealed that COCOBOD has either refused, neglected or failed to allocate funds to the Licensed Buying Companies (LBCs), especially, Produce Buying Company (PBC) as mandated for cocoa purchases.
We wish to state the following:
i. We categorically deny any such claims as wholly untrue and therefore cannot be one that was arrived through a meticulous investigation.
ii. PBC which is the only state owned LBC was allocated the biggest seed fund, which was in excess of GHC390million. In addition, PBC received an amount of GHC121million for payment of cocoa delivered within October/November this year. The released amount is far in excess of what is required by PBC for their cocoa purchase within the period.
iii. A meticulous investigation or an enquiry would have revealed to CSS that the issue in question was not borne out of the refusal or failure on the part of COCOBOD to release funds for the purchase of cocoa.
iv. Funds have been made available to all qualified LBCs who have provided bank guarantees. COCOBOD’s policy of protecting public funds by advancing seed funds against bank valid guarantees remain unchanged and will continue to be in force.
v. It has come to our notice that some LBCs through their own internal challenges have not been able to pay cocoa farmers even though they have received seed funds from COCOBOD. We are engaging all such LBCs to ensure that they immediately get their challenges resolved and offer prompt payment to the farmers to avoid the transfer of their organizational challenges to the farmers who have no hand in creating the problem they face.
COCOBOD wishes to assure all farmers that it has performed its responsibility as expected by releasing funds to all the LBCs including PBC and therefore any problem encountered is not from COCOBOD but regardless we shall facilitate to ensure that they are paid.
Disclaimer: Opinions expressed here are those of the writers and do not reflect those of Peacefmonline.com. Peacefmonline.com accepts no responsibility legal or otherwise for their accuracy of content. Please report any inappropriate content to us, and we will evaluate it as a matter of priority. |
COCOBOD, if the farmers have not received their money, just work on it and stop this plenty grammar! They need their money and its you they know!
This is the work of the opposition Ndc, they have setup such research groups and given them names just to blow 1ies and to confused the public but it will not work Ghananaians are wild awake wai.
Ndc are desperate and doing any st*upid thing thinking Ghanaians are as st*upid as their followers! let me tell them their 4 regions are their potion and they can never win the hearts of the rest to win elections in Ghana! ndc has never won any elections in Ghana, they rig like they did in their just ended congress and they think they can use that strategy in 2020 to win the elections like the NPP will be sleeping that day, so they think tey can use their so called vigilante to protect ballot boxes to snatch those boxes and they think after snatching the NPP WILL allow them to bring their own or what? During that time any motor bike that will move around any polling station must be destroyed! We are in power, they are not in power!and NPP WILL never allow them to intimidate Ghanaians! They must be ready for what they intend to do because they will never have it easy! If they think NPP of yesteryear is today they might be joking! Those days are gone when Allotey Jacobs could sit on radio and warn we will beat them, this time they will give you hefty blows.We will never give our country to cartels to build their empire .